By Adam Drapcho and Julie Hart, The Laconia Daily Sun

On this week’s episode of The Granite Beat we welcome Ann Hermes, who worked for the Christian Science Monitor for 12 years before becoming an independent photographer. Ann produces images that look like postcards from a rapidly changing world, providing images from the Arab Spring, NYC ‘dining sheds’, and one of the few remaining drive-in theaters. Most recently, she has been working on a meta-project to chronicle local newsrooms – those that remain at least – around the United States.

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity and length

Adam Drapcho:

We referenced in the intro that you worked for the Christian Science Monitor for many years. You've done lots of work internationally as well. How do you describe your career up to this point?

Ann Hermes:

I've been incredibly lucky. I've travelled the world. I've also photographed in small communities. I think that it was incredibly important for me to understand how to photograph the local pig farmer in an engaging way before I went on to photograph the Arab Spring. I think your grandma could probably take a good photo in certain areas of India or certain far flung areas, but to be able to do a compelling story on a local community that may not seem as exotic, is a valuable skill.  was grateful to have a grounding in local journalism before I started my international work, because I think that it helped me see the stories in the international communities that were important to those particular communities, meaning I wasn't always taking the splashiest images in far-flung places, but I was telling stories that I think anyone anywhere could connect to – it wasn't just like, “wow, look at this splashy, incredible image from this place that I have never seen”, but more of, “look at this woman in her kitchen in rural Egypt, I can connect with that.” So I feel like my grounding in local journalism actually really empowered my international work.

Adam Drapcho:

It seems that you're describing something of a value distinction between what you said was the splashy image versus a different image that might be quieter, but more relatable. Could you tell me how you think about that value distinction?

Ann Hermes:

In journalism there is still a push for that old saying of “if it bleeds, it leads”. If it's sexy, if it's dramatic, if it seems foreign and exotic, it's going to catch people's attention – we're all about clicks and eyeballs these days. But that's not the reason why I got into journalism in the first place. I wanted to learn what I could about things that I didn't know about and people that I wouldn't normally interact with. So the value for me is to be able to make sure that readers and viewers can feel part of the connection that I have made to people in those communities, whether they are in India, Egypt, China, or the county right next to them. I want to be able to convey through my photography a sense of understanding and commonality whenever I can find and portray that.

Julie Hart:

You've provided coverage of many intriguing stories, both domestic and abroad. Are there any that stick out for you that you'd like to highlight?

Ann Hermes:

My international work in Egypt was definitely compelling, because I covered the Arab Spring interior square. I think it was only the second international assignment I’d ever had, so it was a very formative time in my career. But it also was the first time that I feel like I witnessed history happening right in front of my camera. It was incredibly dramatic, and very intense – everything that we just described being flashy. I ended up going back to Egypt a few times afterwards to kind of show and document the outcomes of the revolution, both good and bad and, to be completely honest, those were the instances that I was most proud of, to be able to see the impact of this historical event and try to show that to American audiences who might have moved on once the hubbub in Cairo had started to calm down. That coverage was really important to me and also helped shape the approach I was just describing earlier, how the quieter moments are actually more informative and compelling if you seek them out and try to relay them to a Western audience.

Julie Hart:

Speaking of the quieter moments, how did the idea come about for your current project, where you're chronicling local newsrooms here in the US?

Ann Hermes:

I obviously love newspapers and have committed my career to them. I grew up with the St. Louis Post Dispatch, and when they were running a lot of wire stories on their front page I went to visit their newsroom for the first time. I've always been blown away by the incredible work they've done, so when I entered into the newsroom and saw that there were outlines of where desks had been in the carpet and that the newsroom was so sparse, sort of a visual representation of why there were so many wire stories and not as much local news in the actual paper. I felt really compelled to capture and document that so that people would understand what was happening to their local newspapers, and just try to rally some support and understanding from these communities. Because I think that there's a perception of journalists nowadays of being a little elitist and out of touch with rural communities, but I have found that to be completely the opposite. On a local level, the people who work at local newspapers are incredibly committed. They're embedded in their communities. They have to follow what I would frankly call the ‘grocery store’ test, which is if you publish a story that is going to piss a lot of people off, you're going to have to go to the grocery store the next day and face all of the community that you just wrote about. I think local journalists are incredibly thoughtful, bipartisan, careful, and dedicated and I wanted to find a way to showcase that to audiences – especially during the fake news era that we're in currently.

Adam Drapcho:

Can you give us a sense of how many newsrooms you've visited so far, where they have been distributed in the country, and how many you hope to get to?

Ann Hermes:

I visited a little over 20 so far, ranging from Alaska to Florida. I started in 2019 and the pandemic obviously put a pause on the project. But now that I can see some more cutbacks and layoffs by major publishers around the bend, I'm ramping up the project on a much more intensive scale. So I hope to get into the hundreds. Lately I've been focused on the New England area, but I would like to move to the South – especially because I think there are even fewer papers in that region, and I would really like to document some of the local papers there.

Adam Drapcho:

What do you plan to do with this project that you're working on about newsrooms?

Ann Hermes:

I hope to make it a book eventually. I hope to also develop a research project, and have a historical documentation of this incredible time of transition in local journalism. I also hope to find a way to help get visual journalists back into local newsrooms, or train local reporters on how to be decent visual journalists. So I have sort of a twofold part of it, where I just love the photo documentation of these spaces and people like you guys – I just enjoy it, I won't stop, I just love it so much. But I also think that there's a lot that could be done and needs to be done for local reporting, and also for the general public to understand why local journalism is so important to our democracy as a whole – informed communities can make decisions about their politicians and policies in ways that just matter so deeply. So I hope that these images convey some of that to people who aren't in the news industry. Any way that I can get these images out to people who aren't deep in journalism, I think that's part of the battle to win.

Adam Drapcho:

Where should people go to see your work?

Ann Hermes:

Right now you can go on my website, www.AnnHermesPhoto.com, where I have a whole section dedicated to newsrooms. You can also follow along on Instagram @yourlocalnewsroom, where I'm going to start including some of the more interesting research and interviews and information that I’ve found so that it’s not just a fun photography project, but also conveys some ideas about where local journalism is going – hopefully to help inspire other local newsrooms, but also to get people more involved in thinking about local journalism. Whether they're in or out of the industry, I would love for people to follow along. And if anyone out there has newsrooms you think I should particularly photograph, I am all ears and would always love to visit some of these places.

This article is part of The Granite Beat, a project by The Laconia Daily Sun and The Granite State News Collaborative, of which Laconia is a partner. Each week Adam Drapcho and Julie Hart, will explore with local reporters how they got some of the most impactful stories in our state and why they matter. This project is being shared with partners in The Granite State News Collaborative.